Today, I attempted to plane the appropriate shape into the edge of the keel hardwood and broke my very nice hand plane.
I then attempted to shape and fit the stem finish to the hull and just managed to roughly shape the piece of PVC. After about two hours of heating and shaping whilst soft instead of shaping only the keel end and then bending as I did with the other hull, things went from bad to worse and it looked more like a French Horn than the front end of a slippery cat. So I hope I can fill with runny glue mixture tomorrow and glue it on ready for fairing during the week.
It’s also taken me about 2 hours to write a 10 minute email to the US, so I have given up and spent some time researching an idea we have for Binary’s rig.
Here are some images of my stuffing around with the piece of 25mm PVC.
on Jun 29th, 2005 at 9:32 am
Hi Tom,
Though you may not need this info now, here is how I did it:
To form the PVC pipe to a smooth curve, make a pattern or form to match the INSIDE radius of curvature. Use most any flat material of similar thickness as the pipe. I used a scrap piece of styrofoam (polystyrene) house insulating board. Mount pattern on a base such a larger piece of same material, or plywood, etc. Heat the pipe over a wide (electric) heating device such as the heating element of an electric hob, or in an oven. Heat the pipe until almost as flexible, but not quite as flexible as a wet noodle. This will likely require you wear heat resistant gloves and that you rotate the pipe during heating, testing it for flexibility. when you think it is flexible enough, heat a few seconds longer. Now, try to maintain the pipe as straight, and supporting both ends, place the pipe gently and quickly on the form base board and bend it to the pattern. Hold for a few seconds. Spring back will be slight if at all. Rotation of the pipe during heating is important as it promotes even heating. Any cold spot, overheating, or under heating can cause the pipe to become oval in crossection in the bend. Sounds tedious and more difficult than it is. I have tried the heat gun method and got inconsistent results, but the described method has not failed.
If spring back is too much, simply make compensation in the pattern, reheat the pipe until pliable, and reapply to the pattern.
Cheers,
Jim
(Edit by Tom: Thanks Jim, this will certainly help in the future as there are quite a few more jobs for PVC pipe)